CAPA is a tricky sort of program to define. My mother persists in telling people I’m going to the University of London, which is not even slightly true. I have an associate member card to the student union of the Imperial College which is LOOSELY affiliated with the University of London, and that’s as far as that goes. Also incidentally apparently Imperial is the fifth best school in the world, or so they claim.
The Center for Academic Programs Abroad (CAPA) partners with American universities to develop programs that meet the home universities’ academic standards to the extent that Pitt can call the program ‘Pitt in London,’ but because it’s doing the same thing for a few other schools it’s not really Pitt, and it’s all terribly perplexing.
The three biggest contributor schools are Pitt, Massachusetts and Minnesota, but there are a handful of kids from other universities, mainly Rider, Buffalo, and Ursinus. Of course anyone from Ursinus I always ask if they know Josh Ecker, and so far all of them have said oh my god yes he’s so great how do you know him? How do I know Josh Ecker? How? I went to preschool with Josh Ecker. I’ve been camping with Josh Ecker. I’ve seen in a decade’s worth of New Years with Josh Ecker! My Josh Ecker street cred is unparalleled, and subsequently the Ursinus kids have much respect for me.
And while we’re playing Jewish geography of sorts, a friend of Chloe’s whose studying in Paris was here the other night and she brought a friend with her who grew up in Blue Bell. I asked if she knew Gabrielle or Noah Stang and she said absolutely, and wasn’t Gabby’s mom so nice. (Hi Wendy!) So here’s this random girl in a pub with me in London and we probably were on the same birthday party circuit when we were seven. ‘Small world’ feels like an understatement.
Yesterday we woke up and were like eh, want to go to the Tower? I think that may be my favorite part of living here, that we’re justified in doing all the touristy things but at the same time we have weeks to do them. So we toured the Tower of London essentially on a whim, also walked across Tower Bridge and then walked back just so we could say we’d done it. They’ve painted it a gaudy blue in preparation for the 2012 Olympics. The crown jewels exhibit is excellent, there’s a moving walkway like at an airport that takes you past them so no one can loiter and block the view which I always find most troubling at the popular exhibits in museums.
But the thing about being only half tourist as it were is a subsequent frustration with full bred tourists. Oxford Street may in fact be the best shopping locale in the world, it is indisputably ridiculously convenient to my flat, and it is absolutely riddled with tourists. I have never considered myself particularly claustrophobic but even I could not have taken another second inside Primark or TopShop. We’ve given up entirely on going there to accomplish any real shopping, but will probably still wander back occasionally if only because I find something about Selfridge’s delightfully silly. Also it beats out Posvar Hall AND Scaife Hall for the coveted title of ‘Best Escalator Riding in the Free World,’ a title I feel myself uniquely qualified to bestow given my courier experiences.
We’re about to head out to try Camden Market now, it’s supposed to be sort of punk-ish.
Sunday, January 31, 2010
Friday, January 29, 2010
Commies!
For reasons pertaining to his own amusement my British Culture professor likes to introduce the UK’s many newspapers by first describing the type of people who read them and then matching that description to members of the class.
This is how he described the readership of the radically conservative ‘Daily Mail.’
“You’re lying awake in the dark night. A tree branch scrapes against your window. You hear a scratching noise in the corner in the shadows. The scratching gets louder, then louder. Terrified you clutch your bedclothes and whisper ‘…Commies!’”
He’s my favorite.
Yesterday I worked in the morning and then had a field trip for European Government to the Imperial War Museums. Even the grunt work at Murad is actually pretty cool: I was updating all of the product line press releases with the new prices so basically just copying and pasting, but now I know what all the press releases are like and how the language works for that. Also I finished all of them in just a few hours which apparently no intern has done before, so, yes.
Imperial War Museum was not terribly interesting, and I actually probably have to go back for a different class anyway. I did do the Holocaust exhibit though, which is pretty heavy for a mid-afternoon jaunt, so now I’ve seen Holocaust museums on three continents. I don’t know what to say about that distinction.
Chloe and I are watching Viva UK 40 music videos right now -basically British mtv- and it’s remarkable how blended the cultures have become. Half the singers we’re debating if their American or not. We are double checking our answers on Wikipedia and we are usually wrong.
Brief exploration around Piccadilly Circus yields the conclusion ‘like Times Square but shorter buildings, less neon, and more likelihood of being pick-pocketed’.
The student council would appear to be comprised of studious action-minded individuals, with lots of pertinent questions and logical suggestions. So basically the polar opposite of any student body governing organization I’ve ever participated in.
Later we checked out the pub at Imperial College, the university CAPA is loosely affiliated with only in the sense that we can join their clubs if we so choose, and the International Students House known as ish. Where there was karaoke. Of Backstreet Boys. Which I did not participate in at all or even slightly, but felt disconcertingly like a contemptible drunken American just by witnessing.
I keep hoping to eventually catch up enough on documentation of current events and on-goings to have time for some reflection on what being here is like, but alas not yet.
This is how he described the readership of the radically conservative ‘Daily Mail.’
“You’re lying awake in the dark night. A tree branch scrapes against your window. You hear a scratching noise in the corner in the shadows. The scratching gets louder, then louder. Terrified you clutch your bedclothes and whisper ‘…Commies!’”
He’s my favorite.
Yesterday I worked in the morning and then had a field trip for European Government to the Imperial War Museums. Even the grunt work at Murad is actually pretty cool: I was updating all of the product line press releases with the new prices so basically just copying and pasting, but now I know what all the press releases are like and how the language works for that. Also I finished all of them in just a few hours which apparently no intern has done before, so, yes.
Imperial War Museum was not terribly interesting, and I actually probably have to go back for a different class anyway. I did do the Holocaust exhibit though, which is pretty heavy for a mid-afternoon jaunt, so now I’ve seen Holocaust museums on three continents. I don’t know what to say about that distinction.
Chloe and I are watching Viva UK 40 music videos right now -basically British mtv- and it’s remarkable how blended the cultures have become. Half the singers we’re debating if their American or not. We are double checking our answers on Wikipedia and we are usually wrong.
Brief exploration around Piccadilly Circus yields the conclusion ‘like Times Square but shorter buildings, less neon, and more likelihood of being pick-pocketed’.
The student council would appear to be comprised of studious action-minded individuals, with lots of pertinent questions and logical suggestions. So basically the polar opposite of any student body governing organization I’ve ever participated in.
Later we checked out the pub at Imperial College, the university CAPA is loosely affiliated with only in the sense that we can join their clubs if we so choose, and the International Students House known as ish. Where there was karaoke. Of Backstreet Boys. Which I did not participate in at all or even slightly, but felt disconcertingly like a contemptible drunken American just by witnessing.
I keep hoping to eventually catch up enough on documentation of current events and on-goings to have time for some reflection on what being here is like, but alas not yet.
Monday, January 25, 2010
Product Training
When my internship supervisor Zoe told me I’d have to do some product training to familiarize myself with the Murad line before I started working on anything PR-related, I imagined we’d sit at her desk for a lunch hour or two and casually discuss day cream and clarifying serum.
I did not imagine a three day intensive course with an expert product trainer imported from Manchester and ten licensed skin therapists. Or power point presentations and bound booklets and detailed scientific explanations and histories or literally running out of skin on my hands and arms to try things on.
Seriously, right now I have assorted swatches of mica-infused shimmering balm and environmental protection with spf and hydrating silicon-based gooks all contradicting each other to an inconceivable end, and one side of my neck feels bizarrely firmer than the other, and my left wrist is “sleeping” because there are hormone-laced topical on it that are making it think it’s nighttime. Or something.
Still, it’s really very cool. There is more to skin care that I ever considered. I mean in all honesty I sort of considered dietary supplements and firming lotions to be sort of dubious frauds, but no. I have now witnessed firsthand the startlingly immediate effects of moisturizers that cause a palatable difference in your skin quality, contemplated the properties of Asian superfruits, and articulated The Murad Water Principle in my own words.
And I am here to tell you that it is legit.
Also when I came in this morning there was a little tin of pens and office-y things on the desk that I suppose is mine now marked ‘Sarah’s Stuff’ and I was totally charmed and welcomed by the gesture, even more so when I saw it contained an adorable sample of my favorite Murad lip balm.
I stayed late to help the product trainer set up for tomorrow’s session and was thus able to log a full nine hours for today. I need an average of twenty a week to fulfill my visa requirements, so I’m hoping to work late a few nights and then take off a day or two to travel or something.
I have launched an initiative to visit at least one museum and/or historically or culturally important location per weekend. You can follow my exciting exploits- …right here, actually. I ought to be posting illustrative photographs but they take forever to upload to the blogger site, so I refer you to Facebook for those (I highly recommend Chloe or Rachel’s albums over my own, which though well-annotated are somewhat sparse).
Tomorrow I may have to take one for the team and volunteer to have facials demonstrated on me.
I did not imagine a three day intensive course with an expert product trainer imported from Manchester and ten licensed skin therapists. Or power point presentations and bound booklets and detailed scientific explanations and histories or literally running out of skin on my hands and arms to try things on.
Seriously, right now I have assorted swatches of mica-infused shimmering balm and environmental protection with spf and hydrating silicon-based gooks all contradicting each other to an inconceivable end, and one side of my neck feels bizarrely firmer than the other, and my left wrist is “sleeping” because there are hormone-laced topical on it that are making it think it’s nighttime. Or something.
Still, it’s really very cool. There is more to skin care that I ever considered. I mean in all honesty I sort of considered dietary supplements and firming lotions to be sort of dubious frauds, but no. I have now witnessed firsthand the startlingly immediate effects of moisturizers that cause a palatable difference in your skin quality, contemplated the properties of Asian superfruits, and articulated The Murad Water Principle in my own words.
And I am here to tell you that it is legit.
Also when I came in this morning there was a little tin of pens and office-y things on the desk that I suppose is mine now marked ‘Sarah’s Stuff’ and I was totally charmed and welcomed by the gesture, even more so when I saw it contained an adorable sample of my favorite Murad lip balm.
I stayed late to help the product trainer set up for tomorrow’s session and was thus able to log a full nine hours for today. I need an average of twenty a week to fulfill my visa requirements, so I’m hoping to work late a few nights and then take off a day or two to travel or something.
I have launched an initiative to visit at least one museum and/or historically or culturally important location per weekend. You can follow my exciting exploits- …right here, actually. I ought to be posting illustrative photographs but they take forever to upload to the blogger site, so I refer you to Facebook for those (I highly recommend Chloe or Rachel’s albums over my own, which though well-annotated are somewhat sparse).
Tomorrow I may have to take one for the team and volunteer to have facials demonstrated on me.
Sunday, January 24, 2010
Chloe Is Always Right
Trying to manage a bevy of girls celebrating a twenty first birthday is like herding butterflies.
Gorgeous, awesome, wonderful butterflies.
In celebration of Latia’s legal coming of age she and all her flat mates –henceforth known as the Belgravia girls because that’s the part of London they’re living in and because we will need to refer to them more because they are epically fun- joined Chloe and I at a bar our flat mates assured us would be awesome.
Unfortunately they made this assessment based solely off a flyer promising cheap drinks which upon closer inspection turned out to be only on Wednesdays and live bands which would have been better suited to a high school open mic night. And no dancing!
Clearly that would never do, so my fellow cruise director Umlaut and I navigated multiple tube transfers with ten plus people in tow (Where’s Jen? Did we lose Abby? Quickly everyone, to the Bakerloo line! No, brief stop at Sainbury’s!) back to our flat for an impromptu dance party of our own before deciding on heading back to the club we were at last night, Moose, which was a great time. The Europeans pronounce it ‘muse’ but the décor includes antler silhouettes and other such rustic allusions, so my bet is on ‘moose’.
Unfortunately Moose is somewhat BYOB. Plenty of alcohol but totally bring-your-own-boys if you don’t want to risk getting creeped on. Being as big a group of girls as we were we probably would’ve been fine, but we took the precaution of inviting our friends from Flat 6 along.
Now, you would think Flat 5 would be on one floor and Flat 6 would be above it, right? That would be logical, yes?
London architectural design laughs in the face of logic.
Which is why when I took the spiral fire escape staircase upstairs a few minutes later to ask the gentlemen drinking on the balcony above what was taking them so long, I was mortified to realize I was not addressing the intended group of boys at all, but rather the inhabitants of Flat 7. If I’d been a little slicker I might have told them to come out with us anyway, but things being what they are I apologized for the inconvenience and disappeared. So that’s their story for the weekend.
Eventually we got everyone down Oxford Street to the club, right by the French Connection UK store (“Oh, Eff see you kay?” asked Abby. “Sorry, I don’t speak French,” I replied, blatantly missing the abbreviation.) Moose is fairly inexpensive as far as London dance clubs seem to go, with a three pound cover charge which is really four because you have to pay to check your coat, and you can’t not check your coat, but inexpensive in London is a total oxymoron when you consider that a pound is nearly two American dollars. As far as I’m concerned it’s worth it, because so far it’s two for two spectacularly fun nights, but perhaps not for twice every weekend.
And to think I used to leave the dancing to Emily! Why should the triple threat girl (acting, singing, AND dancing) get all the fun? No, no I say to that.
This morning I utilized my secret super power to get a hot shower (Oh, did you not know that waking up before nine regardless of how late I stayed up the night before was my secret super power? Because it is. I am physically incapable of sleeping in.) and got some reading done for classes before Chloe and Rachel and I headed over to the Tate Modern Art Museum.
The collection is a lot of darker things and really minimalistic modern-y modern art of which I’m not so fond, but there were a few pieces I loved. Or rather the phrase that came to mind before I could banish it with a shriek of no-no-I’m-not-my-mother-noooo was ‘made my heart sing’. Thanks Mom (yes there was a Monet water lily).
The coolest exhibit was a multiple artist collaboration exploring different interpretations of this one throw away anime character they somehow obtained the rights to, and the disconcerting implications of identity and self-possession of fictional characters. I did not like when it stared at me with its blank digital eyes.
Walked across the millennium bridge (apparently it’s the one that gets destroyed in one of the Harry Potters) to St. Paul’s Cathedral where there were bells, successfully navigated the weekend tube home (they shut down 80% of the lines and then mangle the remaining ones for maximum fun/problem-solving skill practice/”construction”) and discovered at awesome curry place a few blocks down from our flat.
In summary, brilliant weekend.
Tomorrow I start my internship!
Gorgeous, awesome, wonderful butterflies.
In celebration of Latia’s legal coming of age she and all her flat mates –henceforth known as the Belgravia girls because that’s the part of London they’re living in and because we will need to refer to them more because they are epically fun- joined Chloe and I at a bar our flat mates assured us would be awesome.
Unfortunately they made this assessment based solely off a flyer promising cheap drinks which upon closer inspection turned out to be only on Wednesdays and live bands which would have been better suited to a high school open mic night. And no dancing!
Clearly that would never do, so my fellow cruise director Umlaut and I navigated multiple tube transfers with ten plus people in tow (Where’s Jen? Did we lose Abby? Quickly everyone, to the Bakerloo line! No, brief stop at Sainbury’s!) back to our flat for an impromptu dance party of our own before deciding on heading back to the club we were at last night, Moose, which was a great time. The Europeans pronounce it ‘muse’ but the décor includes antler silhouettes and other such rustic allusions, so my bet is on ‘moose’.
Unfortunately Moose is somewhat BYOB. Plenty of alcohol but totally bring-your-own-boys if you don’t want to risk getting creeped on. Being as big a group of girls as we were we probably would’ve been fine, but we took the precaution of inviting our friends from Flat 6 along.
Now, you would think Flat 5 would be on one floor and Flat 6 would be above it, right? That would be logical, yes?
London architectural design laughs in the face of logic.
Which is why when I took the spiral fire escape staircase upstairs a few minutes later to ask the gentlemen drinking on the balcony above what was taking them so long, I was mortified to realize I was not addressing the intended group of boys at all, but rather the inhabitants of Flat 7. If I’d been a little slicker I might have told them to come out with us anyway, but things being what they are I apologized for the inconvenience and disappeared. So that’s their story for the weekend.
Eventually we got everyone down Oxford Street to the club, right by the French Connection UK store (“Oh, Eff see you kay?” asked Abby. “Sorry, I don’t speak French,” I replied, blatantly missing the abbreviation.) Moose is fairly inexpensive as far as London dance clubs seem to go, with a three pound cover charge which is really four because you have to pay to check your coat, and you can’t not check your coat, but inexpensive in London is a total oxymoron when you consider that a pound is nearly two American dollars. As far as I’m concerned it’s worth it, because so far it’s two for two spectacularly fun nights, but perhaps not for twice every weekend.
And to think I used to leave the dancing to Emily! Why should the triple threat girl (acting, singing, AND dancing) get all the fun? No, no I say to that.
This morning I utilized my secret super power to get a hot shower (Oh, did you not know that waking up before nine regardless of how late I stayed up the night before was my secret super power? Because it is. I am physically incapable of sleeping in.) and got some reading done for classes before Chloe and Rachel and I headed over to the Tate Modern Art Museum.
The collection is a lot of darker things and really minimalistic modern-y modern art of which I’m not so fond, but there were a few pieces I loved. Or rather the phrase that came to mind before I could banish it with a shriek of no-no-I’m-not-my-mother-noooo was ‘made my heart sing’. Thanks Mom (yes there was a Monet water lily).
The coolest exhibit was a multiple artist collaboration exploring different interpretations of this one throw away anime character they somehow obtained the rights to, and the disconcerting implications of identity and self-possession of fictional characters. I did not like when it stared at me with its blank digital eyes.
Walked across the millennium bridge (apparently it’s the one that gets destroyed in one of the Harry Potters) to St. Paul’s Cathedral where there were bells, successfully navigated the weekend tube home (they shut down 80% of the lines and then mangle the remaining ones for maximum fun/problem-solving skill practice/”construction”) and discovered at awesome curry place a few blocks down from our flat.
In summary, brilliant weekend.
Tomorrow I start my internship!
Saturday, January 23, 2010
Clubs and Markets
Going out in London (but really anywhere):
-Don’t drink anything that isn’t poured in front of you and constantly attended by trustworthy persons
-Try not to dance with anyone you didn’t come with
-Keep at least one person who knows how to get home within sight at all times
-Have Rachel do your eye makeup (she can be bribed into providing this service with cookies)
That said, very fun night out dancing with the flat mates. Two of Anais’ French friends were visiting and several of the boys from the flat above ours came with us so we were quite a large group, but the places (a pub on Oxford Street and a club farther down Oxford Street) were very cool. Bizarrely though almost all the music they played was American, but like two or three years behind the curve, so a little lame. And the great thing about living in Paddington is that we can walk home without fussing with the sketchy night buses.
Some members of our party may have attempted to quote Shakespeare to varying degrees of success while walking back from a night out in London in the rain: definitely memorable.
This morning Chloe and Rachel and I went to Portobello Road, an awesome antique outdoor market in Notting Hill where I must return to purchase a proper English teapot with cloying little painted flowers, for which I am very excited. And we got English breakfasts! With dubious meats and weird tomatoes and eggs cooked exactly unlike the way I like them (i.e. how Dad makes them), but it was an important if stomach-injurious cultural experience.
My course schedule requires me to basically read an entire British novel and an entire Shakespeare play every week. So, I’m going to get on that.
-Don’t drink anything that isn’t poured in front of you and constantly attended by trustworthy persons
-Try not to dance with anyone you didn’t come with
-Keep at least one person who knows how to get home within sight at all times
-Have Rachel do your eye makeup (she can be bribed into providing this service with cookies)
That said, very fun night out dancing with the flat mates. Two of Anais’ French friends were visiting and several of the boys from the flat above ours came with us so we were quite a large group, but the places (a pub on Oxford Street and a club farther down Oxford Street) were very cool. Bizarrely though almost all the music they played was American, but like two or three years behind the curve, so a little lame. And the great thing about living in Paddington is that we can walk home without fussing with the sketchy night buses.
Some members of our party may have attempted to quote Shakespeare to varying degrees of success while walking back from a night out in London in the rain: definitely memorable.
This morning Chloe and Rachel and I went to Portobello Road, an awesome antique outdoor market in Notting Hill where I must return to purchase a proper English teapot with cloying little painted flowers, for which I am very excited. And we got English breakfasts! With dubious meats and weird tomatoes and eggs cooked exactly unlike the way I like them (i.e. how Dad makes them), but it was an important if stomach-injurious cultural experience.
My course schedule requires me to basically read an entire British novel and an entire Shakespeare play every week. So, I’m going to get on that.
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
Nobody Panic!!!
It's alright, you can all settle down. I'm taking eighteen credits again.
I know, I was freaking out too. What would I have done with all that free time? As it is I'm only working one job and not in a single club or association! Luckily I've picked up 20th Century British Fiction, meaning 1.) fewer lit classes to take back at Pitt, both a pro and a con and 2.) six solid hours of literary fun with Chloe and the same professor!
The earlier three hours being composed of Shakespeare.
In addition to those there's European Politics, Intro to British Culture, and London Through Internships which is a supplement of sorts to the internship experience.
So, there's that to be contended with.
Somehow I failed to mention what we looked at at Harrods, which is crucial. Amid some of the best shopping in the world Chloe and I eschewed the clothing, ignored the jewelry, and although we looked briefly and unsuccessfully for the hat section we eventually found what truly captivated us: The Playmobils display.
Gladiator Playmobils, Egyptology Playmobils, Victorian Playmobils, nomads, blue whales ("They're life-sized!" exclaimed Chloe, perhaps meaning that they were life-sized for the playmobil figures but perhaps indicating a troubling lack of knowledge of basic marine biology), they had them all. Delightful.
Later we met up with a smattering of other girls on our program for pub food and pints at their local hangout in Bavaria. Okay not Bavaria per se, but some London neighborhood that sounds close to that. Anyway it was a very nice time and we've ever intention of doing it again on a regular basis. I've decided I infinitely prefer the British style of casual social drinking to the frat party dynamic. Throw in some battered cod and crisped potatoes and you're all set.
And throwing darts is somehow so satisfying!
Other important highlight of today: my first lukewarm shower in London, memorable because every other show has been ice cold (What's cooler than being cool? ...sorry.) And have I mentioned our dangerously heated towel rack? How nice, you might think. No. Not nice. Scalding hot and inconveniently placed. Is alright for putting pajamas on though, because then they're toasty.
Soon we have the ME info session thing. The what? you might ask. This is your blog, everyday around here is ME day for you. But no, not me as in me but me as in My Education, another intriguing feature of the CAPA program focusing on exposing students to cultural events and local locations with an unfortunate acronym.
Also also: it would appear that Chloe and Rachel and I will all be living in the same apartment building in Oakland next year! The tea party never has to stop!
Seriously, we drink ridiculous amounts of tea, all the time.
I know, I was freaking out too. What would I have done with all that free time? As it is I'm only working one job and not in a single club or association! Luckily I've picked up 20th Century British Fiction, meaning 1.) fewer lit classes to take back at Pitt, both a pro and a con and 2.) six solid hours of literary fun with Chloe and the same professor!
The earlier three hours being composed of Shakespeare.
In addition to those there's European Politics, Intro to British Culture, and London Through Internships which is a supplement of sorts to the internship experience.
So, there's that to be contended with.
Somehow I failed to mention what we looked at at Harrods, which is crucial. Amid some of the best shopping in the world Chloe and I eschewed the clothing, ignored the jewelry, and although we looked briefly and unsuccessfully for the hat section we eventually found what truly captivated us: The Playmobils display.
Gladiator Playmobils, Egyptology Playmobils, Victorian Playmobils, nomads, blue whales ("They're life-sized!" exclaimed Chloe, perhaps meaning that they were life-sized for the playmobil figures but perhaps indicating a troubling lack of knowledge of basic marine biology), they had them all. Delightful.
Later we met up with a smattering of other girls on our program for pub food and pints at their local hangout in Bavaria. Okay not Bavaria per se, but some London neighborhood that sounds close to that. Anyway it was a very nice time and we've ever intention of doing it again on a regular basis. I've decided I infinitely prefer the British style of casual social drinking to the frat party dynamic. Throw in some battered cod and crisped potatoes and you're all set.
And throwing darts is somehow so satisfying!
Other important highlight of today: my first lukewarm shower in London, memorable because every other show has been ice cold (What's cooler than being cool? ...sorry.) And have I mentioned our dangerously heated towel rack? How nice, you might think. No. Not nice. Scalding hot and inconveniently placed. Is alright for putting pajamas on though, because then they're toasty.
Soon we have the ME info session thing. The what? you might ask. This is your blog, everyday around here is ME day for you. But no, not me as in me but me as in My Education, another intriguing feature of the CAPA program focusing on exposing students to cultural events and local locations with an unfortunate acronym.
Also also: it would appear that Chloe and Rachel and I will all be living in the same apartment building in Oakland next year! The tea party never has to stop!
Seriously, we drink ridiculous amounts of tea, all the time.
Tuesday, January 19, 2010
“You should just keep a list of everything I say and draw wisdom from it.”
Ironically we cannot recall anything in particular that was actually said today, but I may end up having to write a memoir of Chloë instead of one of London if she has her way. I mean she’s not royalty per se, but peerage is pretty impressive. If nothing else she’s invaluable for matters of British authenticity, and she doesn’t cheat much at cards.
Since last we spoke, er, I posted at you (?) not a terrible lot has occurred, but I’ve got to keep on top of things. There was a panoramic bus tour of all the crucial sights led by one of those terrifically funny and knowledgeable tour guides one is sometimes lucky enough to come across and a spectacularly giggly girls’ night (“No. I was on a ski lift.”) with Umlaut and 8th, who are actually Chloë and Rachel, which my mother could apparently not discern through context clues. Chlo ’s nickname is lurking over her last letter and Rachel was the last roommate to join us, her homestay having fallen through dismally. She basically lives in our room.
Sunday involved an attempt at visiting the Tate Modern museum, foiled by time constraints, and a separate attempt at visiting Camden Market, foiled by tube cancellations (Does the bloody system never actually not have delays and re-routings? Any native you ask will nod wearily and tell you no, it never does not.) and finally a successful visit to Oxford Street, premiere shopping and walking distance from our flat.
Granted my background as a courier means I consider walking distance anything much less than four miles, but still, it’s really just like three turns. Rachel and I split off as Chloë met up with a high school friend also studying in London and explored Topshop and Selfridges, where Rachel and I were informed by a sales assistant that a particular dress we were admiring was three thousand pounds in a tone that clearly conveyed hilariously clearly ‘Please don’t touch.’
Rachel’s personality can be best described as Annoying Summer Camp Counselor, and I say that in the most loving way possible. Her feeling is that everyone should have sunny happy fun all the time and relax. Much as I know I would have despised her had she actually been my camp counselor (I needed my brooding time!) I adore her: she’s the perfect complement to my where-are-we-going-how-do-we-get-there-will-we-be-on-time-probably-not-oh-no anxious nonsense. Truth is we don’t always know where we’re going and lord knows we don’t always know how to get there, but eventually we get somewhere. Usually.
Anyways that tangent aside we got a traditional pub Sunday Roast, which was not totally to my liking but an essential cultural experience. Yorkshire pudding ISN’T EVEN REALLY PUDDING.
Monday I had my internship interview. The internships through CAPA are basically set up so it’s somewhat perfunctory , but an interview is an interview.
I arrived early at King’s Cross but not early enough to find platform 9 and ¾, since the station is a freaking underground labyrinth. Upon arriving at Omega Place I found not a single indication of a major cosmetic company’s headquarters but rather an abandoned warehouse and an ominous fence.
Suddenly out of nowhere a gentleman appeared and when I asked him if he’d ever heard of Murad he said of course, he worked there, and showed me the super secret hidden door and keypad, which led up a narrow stair case to a perfectly lovely converted loft office space.
Crisis thusly averted I met with my supervisor Zoe, who seems terrific. My responsibilities will include some things like writing press releases, blogposts, web copy, updating press kits, and even reading magazines to clip out media coverage and researching competitor brands.
Worst part: I’ll have to undergo product training and use samples of all the cosmetics. Don’t worry about me, I’ll get through it somehow. …Sarcasm aside I’m very excited!
To get academic credit for the internship I also have to complete an internship course, which had its first lecture last night. Eh, s'alright.
Chloë and I had a very violent game of Spit (card game) with the terrorist deck.
Today we walked to CAPA through Hyde Park, where we encountered a swan who wished me ill. I could just tell it had malicious intents towards my personage.
Travel Fair, which was not so much a fair as an opportunity to grab a handful of leaflets on various programs and then Harrods, because it’s Harrods. Most decadent department store ever anywhere, great fun.
Now we rest up briefly before meeting some people for dinner, hopefully fish and chips.
Since last we spoke, er, I posted at you (?) not a terrible lot has occurred, but I’ve got to keep on top of things. There was a panoramic bus tour of all the crucial sights led by one of those terrifically funny and knowledgeable tour guides one is sometimes lucky enough to come across and a spectacularly giggly girls’ night (“No. I was on a ski lift.”) with Umlaut and 8th, who are actually Chloë and Rachel, which my mother could apparently not discern through context clues. Chlo ’s nickname is lurking over her last letter and Rachel was the last roommate to join us, her homestay having fallen through dismally. She basically lives in our room.
Sunday involved an attempt at visiting the Tate Modern museum, foiled by time constraints, and a separate attempt at visiting Camden Market, foiled by tube cancellations (Does the bloody system never actually not have delays and re-routings? Any native you ask will nod wearily and tell you no, it never does not.) and finally a successful visit to Oxford Street, premiere shopping and walking distance from our flat.
Granted my background as a courier means I consider walking distance anything much less than four miles, but still, it’s really just like three turns. Rachel and I split off as Chloë met up with a high school friend also studying in London and explored Topshop and Selfridges, where Rachel and I were informed by a sales assistant that a particular dress we were admiring was three thousand pounds in a tone that clearly conveyed hilariously clearly ‘Please don’t touch.’
Rachel’s personality can be best described as Annoying Summer Camp Counselor, and I say that in the most loving way possible. Her feeling is that everyone should have sunny happy fun all the time and relax. Much as I know I would have despised her had she actually been my camp counselor (I needed my brooding time!) I adore her: she’s the perfect complement to my where-are-we-going-how-do-we-get-there-will-we-be-on-time-probably-not-oh-no anxious nonsense. Truth is we don’t always know where we’re going and lord knows we don’t always know how to get there, but eventually we get somewhere. Usually.
Anyways that tangent aside we got a traditional pub Sunday Roast, which was not totally to my liking but an essential cultural experience. Yorkshire pudding ISN’T EVEN REALLY PUDDING.
Monday I had my internship interview. The internships through CAPA are basically set up so it’s somewhat perfunctory , but an interview is an interview.
I arrived early at King’s Cross but not early enough to find platform 9 and ¾, since the station is a freaking underground labyrinth. Upon arriving at Omega Place I found not a single indication of a major cosmetic company’s headquarters but rather an abandoned warehouse and an ominous fence.
Suddenly out of nowhere a gentleman appeared and when I asked him if he’d ever heard of Murad he said of course, he worked there, and showed me the super secret hidden door and keypad, which led up a narrow stair case to a perfectly lovely converted loft office space.
Crisis thusly averted I met with my supervisor Zoe, who seems terrific. My responsibilities will include some things like writing press releases, blogposts, web copy, updating press kits, and even reading magazines to clip out media coverage and researching competitor brands.
Worst part: I’ll have to undergo product training and use samples of all the cosmetics. Don’t worry about me, I’ll get through it somehow. …Sarcasm aside I’m very excited!
To get academic credit for the internship I also have to complete an internship course, which had its first lecture last night. Eh, s'alright.
Chloë and I had a very violent game of Spit (card game) with the terrorist deck.
Today we walked to CAPA through Hyde Park, where we encountered a swan who wished me ill. I could just tell it had malicious intents towards my personage.
Travel Fair, which was not so much a fair as an opportunity to grab a handful of leaflets on various programs and then Harrods, because it’s Harrods. Most decadent department store ever anywhere, great fun.
Now we rest up briefly before meeting some people for dinner, hopefully fish and chips.
Friday, January 15, 2010
“If you slit open my veins tea would run out.”
Full day of orientating. Predominantly redundant and obvious but nevertheless necessary. In a gap between two Umlat and I explored the proper direction and uncovered the majestic British Natural History Museum. The wings are expansive but the main hall is a delightful menagerie of skeletal beasts, including dodos and fanged critters and that ancient not extinct fish I learned about in fourth grade, dominated by a huge dinosaur skeleton.
The dinosaur skeleton is only a fake casting because THE REAL ONE IS IN THE CARNEGIE MUSEUM IN PITTSBURGH. How cool is that that we have the legitimate article and London of all places displays a gigantic fake?
I say ‘we’ like I’m from there. Which I guess I can decide if I am. I befriended a kid in an Oakland Zoo shirt on principle.
They brought in a police sergeant to expound upon the dangers of the city, or rather tell us the cheapest places for pints, how we could safely dispose of illegal pepper spray and mace (classified in the UK as firearms, minimum of two years’ incarceration for first offence), and that if we were arrested for being stupid drunk he would post the videos on his FaceBook for everyone to laugh at.
Internship orientation with information that it pains me to think anyone could not know about interning (i.e. “Smile!” “Be on time!” “Make good tea!”). Interview on Monday, somewhat a formality but if they despise me on first glance I’ll be reassigned.
Official welcome tea at the Regency Hotel, wherein our lovely academic dean made the statement that titles this post on her slavish devotion to steeped substances and reenacted a brief Monty Python skit.
Charming tiny sandwiches of non eggy substances (I despise egg sandwiches) and intricately built layered concoctions that may have been passion fruit-inspired or improvised tiramisu or key lime pie-based. Superb tea, naturally.
Crazily crowded tube ride home, but the tube is already starting to feel natural.
We now contemplate going to a pub, or instead just waiting around until the pubs close (at eleven p.m.) and complaining and then going to sleep. I hate not having a plan, the overcoming of which will have to be amongst the goals for the semester. Still, I can’t help wanting to know what I should wear or if I need my oyster card (tube fare ticket, just tap it on the turnstile and go) and how much money to bring and how far we need to go and just generally what.
I feel awful putting on makeup and dressing up without my beloved Paulina and Christy, and somehow (black belt be damned) it doesn’t feel safe to go out without the boys. Not in some bizarre female misogynist women-without-men-are-nothing kind of way, because well duh, but it’s just what I’m used to, it's the only form of going out I've ever known.
Called Dad in attempt to assuage homesickness. He told me that girl cat misses me terribly and is hiding under beds again like a poor sad thing.
LATER... like 2:30 a.m. later
Umlat and 8th and I met up with Samuel, also a Praed Street dweller, for our first pints (Beck’s) at a genuine pub, a tiny place called The Grand Western a block down from our flat populated sparsely by friendly locals who insisted on taking our pictures for us. Followed by a detour to some other pub, boasting food and moderately better prices but also middle age drunken Welsh gentlemen who appeared harmless but inquired excessively into our native ancestries and the fabric of my coat.
We then returned to our flat for a viewing of a possibly illegal or at least dubiously acquired copy of ‘The Life Aquatic’ and gin and tonics with our new friend and his flat mate Patrick. Lovely night overall, despite initial darkening of homesickness, kept at bay by charming company and a moderate quantity of (entirely legal here, may I remind you) alcohol.
Tomorrow, we embark early to navigate the tubes and buses given the supposedly temporary shut down of our main line for the panoramic sightseeing tour.
The dinosaur skeleton is only a fake casting because THE REAL ONE IS IN THE CARNEGIE MUSEUM IN PITTSBURGH. How cool is that that we have the legitimate article and London of all places displays a gigantic fake?
I say ‘we’ like I’m from there. Which I guess I can decide if I am. I befriended a kid in an Oakland Zoo shirt on principle.
They brought in a police sergeant to expound upon the dangers of the city, or rather tell us the cheapest places for pints, how we could safely dispose of illegal pepper spray and mace (classified in the UK as firearms, minimum of two years’ incarceration for first offence), and that if we were arrested for being stupid drunk he would post the videos on his FaceBook for everyone to laugh at.
Internship orientation with information that it pains me to think anyone could not know about interning (i.e. “Smile!” “Be on time!” “Make good tea!”). Interview on Monday, somewhat a formality but if they despise me on first glance I’ll be reassigned.
Official welcome tea at the Regency Hotel, wherein our lovely academic dean made the statement that titles this post on her slavish devotion to steeped substances and reenacted a brief Monty Python skit.
Charming tiny sandwiches of non eggy substances (I despise egg sandwiches) and intricately built layered concoctions that may have been passion fruit-inspired or improvised tiramisu or key lime pie-based. Superb tea, naturally.
Crazily crowded tube ride home, but the tube is already starting to feel natural.
We now contemplate going to a pub, or instead just waiting around until the pubs close (at eleven p.m.) and complaining and then going to sleep. I hate not having a plan, the overcoming of which will have to be amongst the goals for the semester. Still, I can’t help wanting to know what I should wear or if I need my oyster card (tube fare ticket, just tap it on the turnstile and go) and how much money to bring and how far we need to go and just generally what.
I feel awful putting on makeup and dressing up without my beloved Paulina and Christy, and somehow (black belt be damned) it doesn’t feel safe to go out without the boys. Not in some bizarre female misogynist women-without-men-are-nothing kind of way, because well duh, but it’s just what I’m used to, it's the only form of going out I've ever known.
Called Dad in attempt to assuage homesickness. He told me that girl cat misses me terribly and is hiding under beds again like a poor sad thing.
LATER... like 2:30 a.m. later
Umlat and 8th and I met up with Samuel, also a Praed Street dweller, for our first pints (Beck’s) at a genuine pub, a tiny place called The Grand Western a block down from our flat populated sparsely by friendly locals who insisted on taking our pictures for us. Followed by a detour to some other pub, boasting food and moderately better prices but also middle age drunken Welsh gentlemen who appeared harmless but inquired excessively into our native ancestries and the fabric of my coat.
We then returned to our flat for a viewing of a possibly illegal or at least dubiously acquired copy of ‘The Life Aquatic’ and gin and tonics with our new friend and his flat mate Patrick. Lovely night overall, despite initial darkening of homesickness, kept at bay by charming company and a moderate quantity of (entirely legal here, may I remind you) alcohol.
Tomorrow, we embark early to navigate the tubes and buses given the supposedly temporary shut down of our main line for the panoramic sightseeing tour.
Thursday, January 14, 2010
First Real Day in London Commences Swimmingly
After sleeping for an unprecedented twelve hours Umlat and I made our first cups of authentically British tea. Our authentically British teapot is utterly confounding and may well be missing some vital heating components, so we improvised by boiling water in a saucepan and then sort of dumping it into mugs.
Thus fortified we threw on out trench coats and set off to explore Paddington, most notably finding THE Paddington Bear, who will now accompany us on all our travels, and the grocery (Sainbury’s). Find pictures wherein the Paddington Bear explores our flat and -I am startled by his sudden appearance- on FaceBook! Also BooBah, which 8th roommate Rachel brought! He is terrifying!
We then meet up with all our roommates for our first ever tube ride [Not that different from SEPTA, but MIND THE GAP!!!] to CAPA, where we’ll take our classes and be orientated tomorrow. Mid-search for a museum Umlat and I were mistaken for Londoners and asked for directions. Needless to say we were flattered beyond belief.
Brief exploration of Paddington followed (must find a new way to string sentences together- and then and then and then and then) wherein we grocery shopped. I was initially concerned as to how I would possibly survive in London on what had seemed a meager meal stipend because every restaurant seemed exorbitantly priced but groceries are actually quite cheap (Umlat and I found a place where we could split lunch for a pound and a half each, two packs of pasta for two and a half pounds, etc.) My theory is that restaurants are so expensive because they have to cover the cost of rent in London as well as the food and preparation.
I endeavored to purchase a small bottle of wine because for the first time in my life I could legally. Examining the selection, over ninety percent of the decently priced ones were from California. Are you happy Mr. Bottleshock!? I wasn’t going to buy American wine in Europe so I found a French, only to be told by the cashier that he needed to see ID because he thought I was fourteen. Dismal.
More tea in the flat because, well, we’re in Lond- I would actually totally have multiple cops of tea in the states, so that’s untrue- when an unexpected eighth roommate showed up, her home-stay having been miserable.
All at a pub for about twenty minutes because they close at eleven, declined to join my suitemates at a bar having to get up early tomorrow.
Cornish Pastries of beef, onion, and potato wrapped in flaky goodness for dinner!
It’s super late here and I have to be up early! Cheerio!
Thus fortified we threw on out trench coats and set off to explore Paddington, most notably finding THE Paddington Bear, who will now accompany us on all our travels, and the grocery (Sainbury’s). Find pictures wherein the Paddington Bear explores our flat and -I am startled by his sudden appearance- on FaceBook! Also BooBah, which 8th roommate Rachel brought! He is terrifying!
We then meet up with all our roommates for our first ever tube ride [Not that different from SEPTA, but MIND THE GAP!!!] to CAPA, where we’ll take our classes and be orientated tomorrow. Mid-search for a museum Umlat and I were mistaken for Londoners and asked for directions. Needless to say we were flattered beyond belief.
Brief exploration of Paddington followed (must find a new way to string sentences together- and then and then and then and then) wherein we grocery shopped. I was initially concerned as to how I would possibly survive in London on what had seemed a meager meal stipend because every restaurant seemed exorbitantly priced but groceries are actually quite cheap (Umlat and I found a place where we could split lunch for a pound and a half each, two packs of pasta for two and a half pounds, etc.) My theory is that restaurants are so expensive because they have to cover the cost of rent in London as well as the food and preparation.
I endeavored to purchase a small bottle of wine because for the first time in my life I could legally. Examining the selection, over ninety percent of the decently priced ones were from California. Are you happy Mr. Bottleshock!? I wasn’t going to buy American wine in Europe so I found a French, only to be told by the cashier that he needed to see ID because he thought I was fourteen. Dismal.
More tea in the flat because, well, we’re in Lond- I would actually totally have multiple cops of tea in the states, so that’s untrue- when an unexpected eighth roommate showed up, her home-stay having been miserable.
All at a pub for about twenty minutes because they close at eleven, declined to join my suitemates at a bar having to get up early tomorrow.
Cornish Pastries of beef, onion, and potato wrapped in flaky goodness for dinner!
It’s super late here and I have to be up early! Cheerio!
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
Complimentary Viewing of Amsterdam
After a somewhat harried family dinner at Nifty Fifties (Philly cheese steaks, because who knows when I’ll have opportunity for those again) I found myself the laughing stock of international departures as my parental units and sibling insisted upon documenting my slow progress through security with cell phone photography.
That accomplished and several tearful phone call goodbyes later I found myself squished onto US Airways Flight 728, served icky barbeque chicken and elderly salad, acquainted with several fellow London-bound Pitt students via my sweatshirt’s helpful advertisement of my university affiliation, and presented with the option of several Bones reruns to peruse. When I exhausted them I turned to the GPS channel, which provides passengers with helpful information like the temperature outside the cabin, an animated representation of the flight’s global progress, and the exact sites and dates of several epic shipwrecks (Titanic 1912, Lusitania 1915). WHY WOULD I WANT TO KNOW THAT!?
Suddenly I notice that my destination is no longer listed as London, no. It is now Amsterdam.
This worries me as my shuttle reservation, flat, indeed my entire program, are not in Amsterdam.
Given the stark facts of an hour and a half wait in holding pattern above Heathrow and a mere forty-five minutes of gas left it was the only option, but still, the four hour delay entailed by the sojourn to the Netherlands was less than welcome. Still it afforded me the opportunity to meet several other students from my program, including Mystery Roommate (i.e. FaceBook-less) Alex.
Finally finally I arrived, exhausted but otherwise safe, at number 5 Praed Street, greeted by Umlat who had given me up for dead and four other flat mates who I confess I’ve yet to learn the names of.
My flat is gorgeous. Spacious and superbly located.
Tomorrow, we take the city.
That accomplished and several tearful phone call goodbyes later I found myself squished onto US Airways Flight 728, served icky barbeque chicken and elderly salad, acquainted with several fellow London-bound Pitt students via my sweatshirt’s helpful advertisement of my university affiliation, and presented with the option of several Bones reruns to peruse. When I exhausted them I turned to the GPS channel, which provides passengers with helpful information like the temperature outside the cabin, an animated representation of the flight’s global progress, and the exact sites and dates of several epic shipwrecks (Titanic 1912, Lusitania 1915). WHY WOULD I WANT TO KNOW THAT!?
Suddenly I notice that my destination is no longer listed as London, no. It is now Amsterdam.
This worries me as my shuttle reservation, flat, indeed my entire program, are not in Amsterdam.
Given the stark facts of an hour and a half wait in holding pattern above Heathrow and a mere forty-five minutes of gas left it was the only option, but still, the four hour delay entailed by the sojourn to the Netherlands was less than welcome. Still it afforded me the opportunity to meet several other students from my program, including Mystery Roommate (i.e. FaceBook-less) Alex.
Finally finally I arrived, exhausted but otherwise safe, at number 5 Praed Street, greeted by Umlat who had given me up for dead and four other flat mates who I confess I’ve yet to learn the names of.
My flat is gorgeous. Spacious and superbly located.
Tomorrow, we take the city.
Monday, January 11, 2010
That's A Dumb Name
'Tea Leaves' seemed somehow one dimensional. My mother argued that they tell a story and were thus perfect, but I think there's more to this than some girl who went to study in England because she liked tea.
There were other reasons.
We threw silly names back and forth and shredded empty Hanukkah gelt wrappers until my cat Skimmer sauntered into the kitchen.
It became immediately apparent to me that I should name my blog Skimbolia for the same reason I named the cat Skimmer, which is to say that I wasn't really sure but it felt right.
~*~*~
Tomorrow I leave for London, to study and intern and gain general life experience. I will be living with my darling Chloe and five (5) other girls.
Also I will have to pass Platform 9 3/4 every day to get to work.
And, like I said,I leave the states tomorrow, so now I leave you.
There were other reasons.
We threw silly names back and forth and shredded empty Hanukkah gelt wrappers until my cat Skimmer sauntered into the kitchen.
It became immediately apparent to me that I should name my blog Skimbolia for the same reason I named the cat Skimmer, which is to say that I wasn't really sure but it felt right.
~*~*~
Tomorrow I leave for London, to study and intern and gain general life experience. I will be living with my darling Chloe and five (5) other girls.
Also I will have to pass Platform 9 3/4 every day to get to work.
And, like I said,I leave the states tomorrow, so now I leave you.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
